Belt Gradings, Making New Friends, And Of Course, Research!

Hello All!

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season filled with good times and great training sessions!
It's been a while and I have a few things to catch up on so I thought I would condense the topics into one post. Sorry for the lack of pictures in advance.

Belt Gradings

I short while back, just after returning from my Japan trip, Halloween weekend Actually, we had some belt gradings take place. Over the weekend I, along with everyone else, watched Matt Kaiser finally get his well deserved brown belt in what was an awesome display of talent and technique. There was also a group going for their blue belts, which is always a fun test to watch, Prof. Keith Owen's 'warm up' reminds me more of a punishment PT session in Basic Training. What made this test more interesting to watch was the fact that two friends who I brought into the club were finally going for their belts. This was a new experience for me, in the recent past there has been classmates who were going for their blue belt that I helped prepare for it, more so than these two, but this was different. This time it was, to me, like I was going through it all over again, I was the one who brought them in, so I felt responsible for them. Of course they both passed with flying colours!

It was cool to see others, friends from work, the 'Navy Connection' as some have said, find the same interest in martial arts as I have and not only join but progress in it. It's a cool feeling to see them promoted, I felt proud, as I always do whenever anyone in the club passes their test, but this time it was as if it were me again. Now hopefully they'll get some friends involved who will train hard and get others involved and so forth and so on...and the family grows, like our own 'Navy Connection' BJJ family tree. I look forward to watching the family, both our club's and the Navy one, continue to grow.

The newly promoted blue belts, Mike (left) and Lionel (Right) they did awesome!



The new blue belt batch, Mike, Lionel and Wes, and Coach Ari.


Making New Friends

I went home, Petawawa ON, for the holidays to see friends and family and, since when I was last home I heard of a Jiu-Jitsu club on base, decided to bring a gi and make some new friends. I contacted Evolution BJJ on Facebook and quickly we became penpals, looking forward to meet each other and train together. While I was only able to make it out to one rolling session the impression made on me was terrific! The Professor there is an amazing man to talk with as well as roll with. We talked about all sort of things, from our own experiences traveling and training to different theories on rolling to the crazy intertwining lineage of BJJ. The rest of the club were nice and friendly and happy to have a new person join them on the mats. I don't know if I was still tired from the plane flight home or if the elevation really does have an effect there but either way I got tired fighting off their strong technique pretty fast. I knew the guys back home would be pretty fit, it being on an Army base and all, but the guys at Evolution BJJ Petawawa sure play a strong game both in fitness and technique! I wish I could have spent more time on the mats with them, I look forward to visiting them next time I'm home!

Research!

I've had a lot of time to think over everything I've experienced traveling the Mini Odyssey in the summer and to Japan in the fall. The packing is going very well and there has been very little to change; everything fits and I can carry it all with ease and there has been very little needed to pick up or discard along the way. This makes me happy. I've had no problem just going from hotspot to hotspot to use my phone or tablet in order to contact people, check e-mail or mark maps etc. I think continuing to map out routes and save locations while in a hotspot in order to use them offline in my travels will continue to be my main way on getting around. Of course, meeting up with someone from the area to show me around would be easier, and maybe cheaper if they have a spot to crash for me, wishful thinking and all. I will have to remember to take the time to explore the place a little to learn how to get around and get oriented instead of rushing around and getting lost.

The main concern I have is money. While I was in Tokyo I kept using the ATM's at the 7-11's as it was the easiest way, but heavy charges comes with that and I want to avoid having $50+ a month in surcharges from withdrawals. Exchanging currency will probably be an issue as well with bouncing around a lot, I'll need to have money for things, like food, but also look to not get hit with a lot of surcharges from exchanging. Right now my answer to this is to have a sit down with a representative from my bank to see what advise they have. Being smart with money will be key, unfortunately I'm not the best in this department, I often bend to convenience. Something I'll have to work on. Anyone with advise on this, your help is appreciated.

As for starting the Odyssey I've decided to do a cross country trek on the buses, seeing the country and visiting all sorts of places to train at as I travel across Canada before heading over to Europe. I'm now starting to put together an idea for mapping out my intended path across Europe and Asia but it'll be awhile before I have anything substantial to post. As it stands my intended stops for the cross country Canadian Odyssey will be as follows:

After leaving here and visiting friends in the Sunshine Coast and Vancouver I'll catch the Greyhound bus and head to Calgary, St. Catharines/Niagara Falls, Toronto, Kingston, Ottawa, Petawawa where I'll most likely be for the holidays, Montreal, Halifax and finally St. John's before flying over to Europe. There's lots of room to see other people and places along the way so if you want me to visit or know of a good place to visit let me know.

Obviously I can't be spending a lot of money on this so I will be staying clear of any places with mat fees and would choose to visit a place that can give me a spot to crash over one I have to spend money on a hotel, but seeing as I'm visiting friends I'm sure there'll always be a couch available.

That's it for now, oh, I guess I could tell you all about the operation on my neck I just had, removing a mass of hard fat cells, Lipomas, that were causing increased pressure and stress on my neck and shoulder and I'm now out of training for another 2 week or more. If you follow me on instagram @PandasOdyssey you already knew all that and saw the pretty pictures. In case you missed them, here they are, enjoy!

All the fun I had the day off the surgery.

The next day, going to have a pretty scar from this.